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5UBC STUDENTS INSPIRE HIGH SCHOOL KIDS TO
PURSUE HEALTH CARE CAREERS!
The Recent Health Care Traveling Road show provided an
opportunity for healthcare professional students from the North
and rural BC to travel to the communities of Fort St. John, Daw-
son Creek and Tumbler Ridge located in the Peace River Re-
gional District. This was an opportunity for students to share their
passion for healthcare with local high school students and in turn,
have the local community share their passion for northern/rural
practice and living. This experience also provided opportunity
for:
Exposure to northern clinical practice
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Exposure to living & working in beautiful Northern BC and,
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An opportunity to learn from other healthcare students.
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For one week in June, Liv Brekke, UBC MOT I student was
part of the Healthcare Traveling Roadshow. This year’s Road-
show included 14 health care students representing 9 different
professions touring 3 different communities in Northern BC.
Liv kindly shares some highlights of her experience.
At the high schools, the majority of our time was spent inter-
acting with small groups of students at hands-on stations. In the
OT area of the “rehab department” (the PT/OT station), some of
the opportunities for students included:
assembling and riding a wheelchair;
•
calibrating a pressure-relieving cushion;
•
using a sock aid;
•
and trying on different splints.
•
The wheelchair obstacle course was definitely the highlight
for most students! For me, talking about Occupational Therapy
with the students really helped reinvigorate my passion for our
awesome profession. It’s pretty humbling to think that, thanks to
the Roadshow, hundreds of kids have now heard about and ex-
perienced OT!
One aspect of the presentations we did, was that we were
able to visit each other’s stations. I probably learned just as much
about my peers’ professions as most of the students did. Among
many other things, I learned what a medical engineering technol-
ogist is and that medical radiation technologists are anatomy
whizzes. I even got to try intubating a training dummy!
One of the highlights of the experience was immersing my-
self in the 3 Northern communities. We had tours of the Fort St.
John Hospital, Dawson Creek and District Hospital, and Tumbler
Ridge Health Centre. There were also numerous recreational op-
portunities including:
wheelchair basketball at the Pomeroy Sports Centre in Fort
•
St. John;
a jet boat tour of the Peace River followed by a picnic BBQ,
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courtesy of local residents;
golfing and dinner in Taylor, BC;
•
a backstage tour of the Paleontology Research Centre in
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Tumbler Ridge; and,
a boat trip to Kinuseo Falls
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To summarize, my experience with the Healthcare Traveling
Roadshow was all about connecting with the community. The
Roadshow delivered on the promise of an opportunity to educate
and engage others about Occupational Therapy. However, the
trip also became about building a new interprofessional commu-
nity with my peers. What surprised and impressed me most, was
the incredibly warm and friendly welcome we received in each
and every place we visited.
So if you’re looking for a place with amazing recreational op-
portunities, where they welcome strangers as friends, and where
OT can really make a difference, rural and northern BC is for you!
I certainly hope I will be back there one day soon.
NORTHERN HEALTH STUDENT TRAVELING ROAD-
SHOW SHOWCASES OCCUPATIONAL THERAPY